Hey there!

Well, we took a week off posting while our friends were in town, but the good news is, now we have lots of new things to tell you about!

To start with, David and I took a Korean cooking class last weekend. We learned how to make cucumber kimchi and a beef-noodle-vegetable dish called japchae / 잡채. Both were really tasty, but the japchae is something most people should be able to make at home with relatively easy-to-find ingredients (as long as you are flexible about mushroom types.)

The finished product!

Japchae / 잡채 (serves 2)

1/2 lb beef (a lean cut, sliced into strips 3'’ long and 1/2'’ square)
handful Shitake Mushrooms
handful Dried Wood Ear Mushrooms
Julienned Carrot
Half a Julienned Onion
One Cup Whole Spinach Leaves
Korean Glass Noodles (made from yam flour)

Sauce
4 Tbs soy sauce
2 Tbs sugar
2 tsp mashed garlic
2 tsp chopped green onion
2 tsp sesame oil
sesame seeds and black pepper to taste
1. Make the sauce.
2. Marinate the beef strips in about half of your sauce mixture.
3. Boil the noodles for about six minutes and then rinse in cold water. Set aside.
4. Use a hot pan to briefly stir fry the ingredients. You’ll do this in four steps:
-First cook the beef fully and set aside.
-Second fry the onion and carrot, adding the mushrooms in for just a second before setting those vegetables aside as well.
-Third, fry the noodles with the remainder of the sauce. The sauce will cook down and thicken, coating the noodles and turning them dark.
-Once this is complete, add the meat, vegetables and spinach to the pan. Cook just until spinach is wilted and serve with sesame seeds on top. Enjoy!